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Marines to hold 'active shooter' exercise at Algiers base

marinecorpssupportfacility.jpg

The main entrance to the Marine Corps Support Facility New Orleans, is at 2000 Opelousas Ave., in Algiers. Marines on Thursday (March 20) will conduct a training exercise focused on responding to an "active shooter" inside the 29-acre installation. The Marines say it is an annual exercise and want to alert neighboring residents, who are expected to see emergency vehicles going in and out of the base. The exercise is 8 a.m. to 1 p.m.
(Paul Purpura, NOLA.com | The Times-Picayune)

Hoping to avoid concern among the residents in surrounding neighborhoods, authorities at the Marine Corps base in Algiers announced they will conduct a training exercise Thursday, built around what Marines described as an “active shooter” scenario. The training involves authorities practicing their response should a gunman get into the Marine Corps Support Facility New Orleans.

Emergency vehicles and responders from local and other agencies are expected to be going in and out of the 29-acre installation at Opelousas Avenue and Hendee Street, adjacent to the Federal City campus. The exercise is scheduled to unfold between 8 a.m. and 1 p.m.

The Marines said it is an annual exercise. But it comes just days after senior military leaders released investigative findings tied to last years’ Washington Navy Yard shooting that left 12 civilian employees dead.

In a Pentagon news conference Tuesday, Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel and Navy Secretary Ray Mabus announced new security measures for military installations and personnel. Defense Department and independent reviews concluded that threats are more common from within the installations than those outside the bases’ perimeters.

They announced results from reviews and investigations stemming from the Sept. 16, deaths at the Washington Navy Yard, in which a federal contractor, Aaron Alexis, carried a concealed shotgun onto the installation and began shooting. Reviews concluded that the killings could have been averted had authorities been properly alerted to Alexis’ history of mental illness.

A former Navy reservist, Alexis was killed by police at the Navy Yard, after killing the 12 workers and wounding four others. His access and security clearance should have been revoked, investigators concluded.

New security procedures announced Tuesday include looking more closely at the people who work at and have access to the military installations. Reviewers recommended that 10 percent of security clearances be revoked, while the military should more closely evaluate the mental health of its recruits.

Hagel said the reviewers found “troubling gaps” in the military’s “ability to detect, prevent and respond to instances where someone working for us – a government employee, a member of our military or a contract – decides to inflict harm on this institution and its people.”

Among the United States' more notorious internal killers was Major Nidal Makik Hasan, who killed 13 soldiers at Fort Hood, Texas, in November 2009. He was convicted and sentenced to death last year.

New Orleans-area installations have been spared mass killings, but have not been immune to domestic disputes. In 2010, Army Major Detric Kelly shot and killed his wife, Kimberly Kelly, inside their residence at the Naval Air Station-Joint Reserve Base in Belle Chasse. Kelly had not registered his gun with base security. A member of the Army ROTC cadre at Tulane University at the time, Kelly later was convicted of murder at Fort Polk and sentenced to life in prison.

In February 2004, a sailor, Landren Swearingen of Dallas, armed himself and held his former fiancée hostage at the Belle Chasse air station for 14 hours. He released her unharmed, ending a standoff with the FBI and the Naval Criminal Investigative Service.

A civilian employed at the base’s housing office, Swearingen's fiancee had gotten a restraining order against him in Plaquemines Parish court, while he was stationed in the New Orleans area. He was reassigned to a command in Alabama, but he returned to Belle Chasse to confront her and smuggled a semi-automatic pistol onto the base. Swearingen was later kicked out of the Navy and sent to prison.

About 1,300 Marines, sailors and civilians work daily at the Algiers installation, which is home to the national headquarters for Marine Forces Reserve and Marine Forces North. The installation opened in 2011.